Mutants of the Caribbean
by mallelen
Summary: Before the XMen...before genetics were understood...back in the golden age of sailing people with EXTRA abilities were called the accursed. These are their stories
1. Chapter 1

**X-Men: Mutants of the Caribbean**

**A Lover's Gambit**

The sun cast grey shadows as set below the tiny pirate town of Los Cados. In the streets there was drinking, inside the Pale Mermaid, the was even more drinking. The town was a buzz with the excitement of the Carnival de la light, the celebration of the Xandiar—the benefactor.

Remy Lebeau sat drinking alone in decidedly dark corner of the Pale Mermaid. With only his drink to keep him company he stared into the poor excuse for liquor like it was his lover's eyes. He only saw his own glowing red.

Around him the din hummed with the excitement of the festival. Pirates stole from each other, then won it back in cards only to lose it all to the enterprising whores. Half an hour ago a minstrel had shown up and had taken out a case full of various instruments. The crowd had solidified into one large foul smelling ruffian and had begun to grow restless waiting for the man to tune his fiddle. He was a gruff looking man with dark hair that framed his face like picture. He had a dark beard and chops to match and wicked looking eyes. Remy watched him struggle with the tuning pegs until one of the strings snapped and whipped across his cheek. The minstrel's eyes filled with rage, he struggled to contain it, he fought the anger down and tried to fix the instrument as best he could. The crowd began to disintegrate. The pirates spat at the minstrel's feet and somehow, as they all made an effort to get as far away from the failed musician as possible they all managed a good kick to boots.

"Get a REAL job," one of the ruffians cried with a thick Irish accent. This pushed the minstrel's buttons.

"Who said that?" He growled and scanned the inn with wild eyes, but no one fessed up. Remy went back to trying to read the secret message on the bottom of his glass. When he looked up the "minstrel" had slouched down into the chair across from him. His head was in his hands, his fiddle had returned to its case.

"You were turning it to tight," Remy said.

The minstrel looked up at the dark stranger in front him. A tall, lean man with long red hair pulled back into a ponytail, a thick brown coat was draped over the back of his chair, next to a sword and pistol hung on a ornately crafted sheath. The stranger's eyes were obscured by the shadows.

"What do you know about playing?" the minstrel grumbled.

"Enough to know you didn't do it," Remy said caustically.

"Some things are hard to forget," the minstrel said, the words rumbling deep in his raspy throat.

In a private room in the Pale Mermaid a battle of the highest urgency was being played out. Jack Sparrow need a ship, and the man across from him, once a great commodore in Her magesty's navy but do to injury had become reckless and eventually unemployed, had one, however he also seemed to have all the cards.

"That's a royal flush for me…and what for you? Ah…another pair. Well done," the former commodore smiled a thin smile as he pulled the pile of coins and trickets towards him.

"Not bad…really," Jack said a slight slur in his voice betraying the large amount of rum he had put back, "for a thief."

"What?" the commodore's eyes widened, his neck stiffened as Jack's compatriot, a large Russian (often reffered to as The Large Russian) grabbed his wrist.

"Keep shirt on, Cyclops," the Large Russian grunted. The commodore narrowed his one good eye (the other covered by a patch).

"What have you got?"

"Three threes," the Large Russian said and plopped them on the table, his mouth spread into a wide grin.

"Wh-wh-wha?" Cyclops muttered, "but that doesn't mean anything!"

"Could you please be a doll, Peter and explain how cards work to this one eyed sea monster?" Jack grinned as the Large Russian bore down on Cyclops, thrusting his three pain in into the Commodore's one good eye.

"look at threes, they'll make it all go down easier," the Large Russian said as he pulled back his fist preparing for a mighty punch.

"But I wasn't cheating!" Cyclops pleaded, "I'd never cheat- it isn't GENTLEMANLY!" The Large Russian stopped and pondered this statement. He looked back to Jack. Jack bit his lower lip and peered at the man in the dirty, faded lace pleading for his life.

"Then how do you account for four-too-many-aces?" Jack asked as he approached. The Large Russian relaxed his grip on Cyclops' throat and he fell to the ground.

"they're not mine!"

Jack and the Large Russian shared a smile.

"Oh really? Then whose cards are they?"

"I borrowed the deck-."

"You borrowed it?" Jack turned to the Large Russian.

"Sounds like 'Steal' to me," the Large Russian commented. Jack nodded and cocked an eyebrow at the cowering man.

"Who'd you steal such an untrustworthy deck from, eh?"

"I-I-I-."

"They're mine, mon ami," a dark voice said from behind.


	2. Chapter 2

**Mutants of the Caribbean:**

**Chapter 2: Jubilia**

Jubilia knew enough not to climb the mast rigging. She also knew enough not to stay on deck during foul weather. For all she knew not to do, however, there she was, ascending the nets in the middle of a storm. Her father would scold her leaving their quarters. He might even punish her if he caught her. Another night of hard used dishes and cups full of who knew what. Sailors were disgusting. Just a bunch of men who left home without any manners in her opinion. Oh well. Who cared. She surely didn't. Nothing would deny her what she desired. Up in the lookout it would find her. She'd feel the wind rip at her face and threaten to toss her back to the ground. The rush of brushing up against raw fury was almost too much for her. And to think, she would never have known such a thing existed if she'd been below deck when that storm hit the first night she was aboard her father's ship. Wasn't she following her father's orders remaining by his side while he worked the wrinkles out of his fresh crewmen? Of course she was. She wasn't to blame. But she knew that explanation wouldn't hold with her father. Not if he knew she was deliberately trying to be struck by a bolt of lightning tonight.

It had happened all of a sudden and with no warning, as she'd always heard it did. One minute she was standing on the mid-deck waiting for her father to come tramping back to her from haranguing some deckhands who weren't tying some ropes fast enough for him, the next... WHAM! All the various bits of sailing gear around her had been singed and the boards of the deck were blackened. When her father came flying around the corner to see if she'd been killed, she realized that she had to claim it had missed her. He wouldn't have believed her if she'd told him it had hit her anyways. And why should he have? Here she was, still alive, hardly blasted into bits and burnt up. No. Much more than that even, but to no one's knowledge but her own. When the lightning bolt had struck her, Jubilia had felt an empty place inside her begin to fill. Even with a direct hit, it was only a glimmer of how it would feel to be complete, but now she knew she had to have it all. Her father wouldn't grasp the slightest bit of it. Twelve wasn't so young. There were boys of ten on her father's boat. It had been their fault he hadn't been watching when the lightning flashed. If they could work on a boat, she could make her own decisions about where she went on that boat and why. One day she might attempt to explain. When she was ready.

Now she was perched in the most likely spot. Lightning would strike her here or nowhere. She suddenly felt afraid. __

What if it wasn't the lightning that made me feel so good? What if I wasn't even hit by the lightning? 

Panic took her and she frantically began seeking the right ropes for her feet to climb down. The sky overhead roiled and belched rain onto everything. Her feet weren't catching the rope tightly enough to start the descent. If she put too much weight on the wrong footing, she would fall, into the sea or onto the deck. She didn't know which would be worse. She took her eyes off the ship and the waves and glanced up in time to see the blinding white flash of a bolt of lightning.


End file.
